Blazers bounce back against wildcats

Fresh off the first defeat of the season, the the Blair varsity softball team (15-1) profited from good hitting and wild pitching to defeat the Walter Johnson Wildcats (4-11). After Walter Johnson scored a run in the top of the first inning, Blair rebounded by scoring 10 in route to a score of 17-4.

After the disappointment of their first loss of the season against Blake only the day before, the Blazers rebounded with a solid performance. The Blazers scored ten runs in the bottom of the first largely due to wild pitches and errors from the Walter Johnson pitcher. The first four Blair runs of the inning were all walks home.

For coach Louis Hoelman III this was the response to the defeat that he was looking for, "After a tough loss like that, you got to come out play hard forget about the loss and they did that jumping to ten runs in the first inning," Hoelman said.

The Blazers got back on the win chart with the victory over WJ. Photography by Sam Howells
Then it was the Walter Johnson's turn to get some offense. After a double, the wildcats mustered up some confidence. They then promptly got a couple of hits to fill up the bases. With the bases loaded the Wildcat hitter roped a two RBI double, but that is all they would get in the inning.

This was to be the Wildcats last gasp, as the Blazers went on to finish them and put the game out of reach. The highlight from this outburst of runs was a sequence when Blair had the bases loaded and freshman Tatiana Davidson arrived at the plate. Davidson then proceeded to crush a triple in which three runs came in for Blair. On the next play, the pitcher threw a wild pitch over the head of the catcher and Davidson took advantage, scoring another run.

"As a freshman I haven't been in the game very much so it was a really great thing for me. When I connected with the ball and it flew, I was like whoa I actually did that," Davidson said.

The Blair defense, other than a few errors, performed pretty well. For pitcher Pietanza, the defense behind her allows her to play her game on a higher level. "I have a lot of confidence in my defense so I work on different pitches and I'm not worried about [the other team] scoring too many runs," Pietanza said.

A possible reason for the few Blair mistakes on defense could be a lack of substantial amount of practice on the field. "The problem has been, we have not had a practice on this field since the two days after spring break. With the rain and everything it has been difficult to get to our field and practice; it is not an excuse because we really want to play well and then get a couple good practices in and get ready for the playoffs," Hoelman said.